CITY OF ASHES

Isabelle, to everyone’s surprise, blushed. A moment later the curtain of vines was drawn aside and a faerie stepped through it, shaking back his long hair. Clary had seen some of the fey before at Magnus’s party and had been struck by both their cold beauty and a certain wild unearthliness they possessed even when they were dancing and drinking. This faerie was no exception: His hair fell in blue-black sheets around a cool, sharp, lovely face; his eyes were green as vines or moss and there was the shape of a leaf, either a birthmark or tattoo, across one of his cheekbones. He wore an armor of a silvery brown like the bark of trees in winter, and when he moved, the armor flashed a multitude of colors: peat black, moss green, ash gray, sky blue.

Isabelle gave a cry and jumped into his arms. “Meliorn!”

“Ah,” said Simon, quietly and not without amusement, “so that’s how she knows.”

The faerie—Meliorn—looked down at her gravely, then detached her and set her gently aside. “This is not a time for affection,” he said. “The Queen of the Seelie Court has requested an audience with the three Nephilim among you. Will you come?”

Clary put a protective hand on Simon’s shoulder. “What about our friend?”

Meliorn looked impassive. “Mundane humans are not permitted in the Court.”

“I wish someone had mentioned that earlier,” said Simon, to no one in particular. “I take it I’m just supposed to wait out here until vines start growing on me?”

Meliorn considered. “That might offer significant amusement.”

“Simon’s not an ordinary mundane. He can be trusted,” Jace said, startling them all, and Simon more than the rest. Clary could tell Simon was surprised because he stared at Jace without offering a single smart remark. “He has fought many battles with us.”

“By which you mean one battle,” muttered Simon. “Two if you count the one where I was a rat.”

“We will not enter the Seelie Court without Simon,” Clary said, her hand still on Simon’s shoulder. “Your Queen requested this audience with us, remember? It wasn’t our idea to come here.”

There was a spark of dark amusement in Meliorn’s green eyes. “As you wish,” he said. “Let it not be said that the Seelie Court does not respect the desires of its guests.” He spun on a perfectly booted heel and began to lead them down the corridor without pausing to see if they were following him. Isabelle hurried to walk alongside him, leaving Jace, Clary, and Simon to follow the two of them in silence.

“Are you allowed to date faeries?” Clary asked finally. “Would your—would the Lightwoods be cool with Isabelle and what’shisname—”

“Meliorn,” put in Simon.

“—Meliorn going out?”

“I’m not sure they’re going out,” Jace said, weighting the last two words with a heavy irony. “I’d guess they mostly stay in. Or in this case, under.”

“You sound like you disapprove.” Simon pushed a tree root aside. They had moved from a dirt-walled corridor to one lined with smooth stones, only the occasional root snaking down between the stones from above. The floor was some kind of polished hard stuff, not marble but stone veined and flaked with lines of shimmering material like powdered jewels.

“I don’t disapprove exactly,” said Jace. “The faeries are known to dally with the occasional mortal, but they always end in abandoning them, usually the worse for wear.”

His words sent a shiver down Clary’s spine. At that moment Isabelle laughed, and Clary could see now why Jace had dropped his voice, because the stone walls threw Isabelle’s voice back to them amplified and echoing so that Isabelle’s laughter seemed to bounce off the walls.

“You’re so funny!” She tripped as the heel of her boot caught between two stones, and Meliorn caught and righted her without changing expression.

“I do not understand how you humans can walk in shoes that are that tall.”

“It’s my motto,” said Isabelle, with a sultry smile. “‘Nothing less than seven inches.’”

Meliorn gazed at her stonily.

“I’m talking about my heels,” she said. “It’s a pun. You know? A play on—”

“Come,” the faerie knight said. “The Queen will be growing impatient.” He headed down the corridor without giving Isabelle a second glance.

“I forgot,” Isabelle muttered as the rest of them caught up to her. “Faeries have no sense of humor.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” said Jace. “There’s a pixie nightclub downtown called Hot Wings. Not,” he added, “that I have ever been there.”

Simon looked at Jace, opened his mouth as if he intended to ask him a question, then seemed to think better of it. He closed his mouth with a snap just as the corridor opened out into a wide room whose floor was packed dirt and whose walls were lined with high stone pillars twined all over with vines and bright flowers bursting with color. Thin cloths were hung between the pillars, dyed a soft blue that was almost the exact hue of the sky. The room was filled with light, though Clary could see no torches, and the overall effect was of a summer pavilion in bright sunshine rather than a dirt and stone room underground.